


No Dress Code: Mementos

by GuileandGall



Series: No Dress Code [30]
Category: Saints Row
Genre: Alternate Universe - Domestic, Angst, Death, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Wakes & Funerals
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-31
Updated: 2017-12-31
Packaged: 2019-02-24 11:53:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 499
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13213188
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GuileandGall/pseuds/GuileandGall
Summary: Do they only give one another gifts on special occasions? No, they do not.





	No Dress Code: Mementos

**Author's Note:**

> This was written in reply to a stack of asks that I was sent by Close (bosselimitchell’s mun), along with a “big dollop of creative license.” She sent me four multi-part questions that wound up becoming drabble inspiration. They’ve taken a while to come to fruition though.

The click of my high heels tapped out a rhythm on the wood floors. Just walking down that hall felt like home, like the warm hugs my parents always had at the ready. The pictures lining the hallway brought a curve to my lips, despite the ache in my chest and stinging in my eyes. Pictures of my brother and I through our time in school; snapshots of each of us as toddlers, gripping tight to our father’s tattooed fingers as we tried out shaky first steps; and photos of my parents, always hugging or kissing and holding hands. Their love seemed so obvious, for one another, for us. They never let us wonder or think we weren’t cared for.

My brother stood in the doorway, his bright aqua eyes filled with grief despite the soft smile on his face when he looked at me.

Our mother had scattered the contents of her keepsake box all over the gray duvet in search of something. Trinkets, knickknacks, and mementos were pushed aside in her search. My parents always traded little gifts—there did not need to be an occasion for one or the other of them to surprise the other. Sometimes it was something silly that reminded them of the other, like the chili pepper figurine with wavy black hair and black lingerie laying near my father’s side of the bed. Other times it was meaningful and cherished—since the Mother’s Day brunch when my father presented my mother with the mother ring he claimed was from all of us, she had never taken it off.

Her mother looked up from the scene on the bed, her eyes going to the dresser before she moved. Her face was more stricken, and it seemed like this was a downward track on the emotional roller coaster our mother had been riding since our father passed. I squeezed my brother’s hand and went to her.

“Mama, what are you looking for?”

The gentle smile on her lips only brightened her eyes for a moment, before the pain returned. It broke my heart and scared me all at once.

“I … I can’t find it.”

“What?” I asked, taking her hand in mine to pull her into a hug.

I didn’t get an answer. This time her tears were silent, though her body shook against mine. I stroked her hair and shushed her softly, trying to remember the words to the song she used to sing me when I was little.

My brother joined us; he whispered softly in Spanish, promising to help her look for whatever it was. Both of us knew that what she really missed we couldn’t give back to her.

I don’t know how long we stayed like that, but it ended when my oldest son cleared his throat from the hallway. “Dad, said to tell you all the car’s here. We need to go, or we’ll be late for the funeral.”

My throat tightened and I held my mother tighter.


End file.
